Penn Dean to Discuss "Men Who Murder Their Families" at DOJ Panel Discussion

PHILADELPHIA — Richard Gelles, the dean of the School of Social Policy and Practice at the University of Pennsylvania, will participate in a panel discussion, “Men Who Murder Their Families: What the Research Tells Us,” June 2 at the National Institute of Justice, the research, development and evaluation arm of the Department of Justice.

This panel is designed to share research into familicides to help the DOJ understand the psychological, social and economic factors that have contributed to a recent surge of family murder-suicides.

Gelles is one of three experts who will discuss the issue and offer insight into the possible motivations.

An expert on domestic violence, child abuse and child welfare, Gelles is a faculty director of Penn’s Field Center for Children’s Policy, Practice and Research and was influential in the passage of the Adoption and Safe Families Act of 1997. He is the author of “Controversies and Domestic Violence” and “The Violent Home.”

Other panel participants include David Adams, the co-founder and co-director of Emerge, a non-profit organization dedicated to stopping domestic violence, and Jacquelyn Campbell, a professor at Johns Hopkins University.

By opening the doors of Penn to remarkable students, the University helps them achieve their full potential as individuals, and also create an academic community that expands and deepens the perspectives of all who are part of it.

One in 32 Americans are either in prison, on parole, or on probation, according to a 2010 report from the United States Bureau of Justice Statistics. Despite the significant number of people affected by the criminal justice system, this “invisible epidemic” has remained largely unaddressed.